THE TUNIS QUESTION.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XV, Issue 4132, 7 May 1881, Page 2

THE TUNIS QUESTION.

(SATURDAY REVIEW.)

Tunis has recently been the scene of events which it was feared might lead to some conflict of interest or authority between England and France. Kheredine Pasha, who left Tunis to figure for a time as j Grand Vizier at Constantinople, was the owner of estates at a place named Eufida, about 50 miles south of the city of Tunis. These estates had been given him by the Bey, and before he left he parted with them to a French Company established at Tunis, and known as the Soci<st6 Marseillaise. The right of the new purchasers to take possession was, however, contested by an English subject of the name of Levy, who also had estates at Eufida, and whose estates were contiguous to those of Kheredine Pasha. By the Mahometan law the owner of adjacent property has a right to pre-emption, and it was this right which Mr Levy claimed to exercise. The French society had, however, as it is alleged, adopted a precaution by which the right of pre-emption was rendered nugatory. A tiny strip of land on the border of Mr Levy's estate had been excepted from the transfer, so that Mr Levy's land did not actually touch the land transferred. \Yhether, under Mahometan law, this device would effectually bar the right of pre-emption, is a question which cannot be answered except by Mahometan lawyers. But, if it were held to bar the right there would be nothing to surprise those who have had any practical acquaintance with working of Mahometan land laws. These laws are seen to introduce in many directions rights which it is found very difficult to adjust practically; and the ingenuity of Mahometan lawyers has been devoted to the discovery of devices by which the law, which is too sacred to alter, has been made inoperative. • Theoretically, there is no reason why there should be a right of pre-emption ; but, if there is such a right, there is no reason why a device for barring the right should not hold good, although it belongs to as infantirie a conception of law as the right itself. Mr Levy, however, was advised that his proper course was to take possession of the land after a tender of the purchase money, so that he might occupy the advantageous position of defendant, and only be turned out if the device of excepting the strip of land was held to be good. The French Company was equally alive to the advantages of possession, and equally resolved to be the first to assert their rights. But Mr Levy got the start, and when the agents of the French company arrived on the spot, they found that the cattle and servants of Mr Levy were already established on the estate of Kheredine. The local authorities would not interfere to turn out the representatives of Mr Levy, and therefore the French company called to its aid a band of Algerian Arabs which it keeps in its pay, and finally took possession. Mr Levy appealed to the French consul, and was informed that the estate was now French property, and that he should uphold the rights of French citizens. Mr Levy then determined to appeal to his own Government, and left for England to lay his grievances before Lord Granville. This is the outline of the story ; but the French Company insists that there was more behind. They say that the present Prime Minister of the Bey, and one or two of his associates, were at the bottom of all the opposition to them. They had hoped that the Bey would comfiscate according to the usual custom of the country, the estates of a fallen Minister, and give them to his new favorites. When they found that simple confiscation had been rendered impossible by tbe transfer to Frenchmen, they made use ofMr Levy and his rights of pre-emption. Every impediment was, it is said, put in the way of the Company. The Government officials took the transfer dues tendered by Mr Levy at once, but were not equally prompt in accepting those tendered by the Company. Mr Levy and his legal advisers got the start of his apponents because the gates of Tunis, which were open to him, Avore shut to them. When the agents of the Company arrived at the estate, they found tnat the cattle placed there to signal the possession of Mr Levy were really the cattle of the Prime Minister and his friends, and the local authorities failed to act simply because they were afraid to thwart persons so highly placed. The Bey has lately shown signs of a disposition to emancipate himself from French control ; or as the French would say, to slip out of his position as a petty chief protected by France, which he is well aware is the position he ought properly to hold. He has shown himself far too friendly to Italy and the Italians, and has seemed prepared to play off his new friends against his old. The French cousul saw in the opposition to the Marseilles company a new and dangerous sign of this tendency. It was really, as he chose to consider it, not a question between a French company and an individual who happened to be an Englishman, but a question between France and the present advisers of the Bey. "He had to deal with what he pictured to himself a sort of rebellion, and he was lifted to a height above all ordinary legal rules. He sanctioned by his presence the employment of a band of foreigners— for in Tunis Algerian Arabs are merely foreigners— to take by force what the local authorities would not give, and he calmly informed an English subject who thought himself aggrieved that he, the French consul, had settled everything, that the estate was now French property, and was therefore placed altogether beyond the jurisdiction of the local authorities. This adventurous consul was technically so entirely in the wrong that it was impossible his Government should uphold him when what had taken place was calmly discussed at London and Paris. Whether, if Mr Levy had been an Italian, there would have been muoh calmness in the discussion of his case at Paris may be doubted ; but France has not the slightest wish to quarrel with England, and would never think of quarrelling on a point where reason was so manifestly against her. The French, however, were as much excited about the wrongs of the French company, and the audacious resistance of the Bey to the French protectorate, as in their present mood they can be about anything that may take place outside the boundaries of Fiance. To fall in with popular humor, the French Government ordered two men-of-war to leave Toulon and go to Tunis. On hearing this Lord Granville very properly ordered two English men-of-war to go to Tunis as a counter-demonstration. The legal rights of English subjects in foreign countries cannot be suffered to be at the discretion of French captains. But a very slight interchange of ideas sufficed to bring about a complete understanding. The French vessels were recalled to Toulon ; the English vessels were tokl that they need not call at Tunis ; and the two Gove:.iments agreed that a poiut of local law must bo left to the local tribunals.

The French Government had really no choice. It could not adopt as its own the line taken by its consul. When French private persons and English private persons residing in a Mahometan country quarrel as to a point of Mahometan law their claims must be left to the judgment of the tribunals of the country to which they have chosen to go. "The French protectorate of Tunis is really a pleasant fiction . It is something that does not exist, but which the French wish should exist. It has never been "brought to the notice of any European power as existing : and Lord Granville had nothing to do with it. But, even" if ifdiU exist, the French would be entitled to say that a question of local law should not be referred to the local tribunals while they remain the only tribunals that can take cognisance of such matters. The French Government could not take up a position which was demonstratably wrong, and this time it had to deal with England. But it is obvious that the French will soon find some better pretext for asserting what they conceive to be the rights of the protectorate they desire to set up, and that they will take care that foreign opponents are not Englishmen), but Italians. Every month the relations between France and Italy in Tunis become more strained, and it is at the expense and humiliation of Italy that a French protectorate will be established if it is established. The commerce of Tunis is much more with Italy than with France, and if the territory of Tunis borders on Algeria, the city of Tunis faces the neighboring shores of Sicily. A joint protectorate like that of France and England in Egypt is out of the question, as France which is ready enough to be on an equality with England, would never consent to be on an equality with Italy. That France at the first opportunity will assume a protectorate over Tunis is as certain as anythiugcan be in foreign politics, and the English Ministry which may happen to be unfortnnate enough to have to decide between acquiescing in the self-assertion of France and the defence of the legitimate claims of Italy will have a painful and difficult task.